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Benefits of improving urban green
infrastructure in Melbourne’s West
Roger Jones and Gayathri MekalaVictoria Institute of Strategic Economic Strategies
Victoria University
Melbourne Forum – Building a healthy urban habitat
Wednesday, 18 June 2014
What is urban green infrastructure?
Infrastructure:
• The basic, underlying framework or features of a
system
Green infrastructure:
• Vegetation systems, natural habitats, rivers and
wetlands and the features that support them (e.g.,
soils and aquifers)
Road transport infrastructure, Melbourne
VicRoads
Green infra-
structure
of the west
in Plan
Melbourne
Benefits of green infrastructure
Three main areas of benefit: economic, environmental and social
Economists measure social benefits as improvements in social welfare, including:
• health and well-being
• environmental quality
• access to services
• community connectivity
• cultural richness and tolerance
We investigate how improvements in environmental quality at the local level benefit community health and well-being. Are they cost effective?
How well might these local benefits scale up to the regional level?
Stony Creek Rehabilitation – Case study
• Context: Redevelopment of an ‘industrial’ site to housing. Stony Creek is currently cement lined, off limits and houses face away from it. The adjacent flood basin is grassed and open to the public.
• Proposal: Remove the cement lining, rehabilitate the creek and plant ~4,000 trees.
• Opportunity: Greening the West project
• Investment: Project costs of $6 – $10 million, ~$10,000 year maintenance costs
Stony Creek case study area
Stakeholder forums
• Research scoping workshop with water utility
– Health benefits through increased physical activity levels
and thermal comfort for visitors
– High quality green space
• Community forum
– a lack of recreation and playing areas
– views of creek with flowing water and trees providing cool
and a peaceful environment
Socio-economic profile of the project beneficiariesDemographic
Criteria
Case Study Area Greater
Melbourne
Population (973 households) 2,837 3,999,950
% Low Income Households 27 8
% With No Formal Education 61 42
% Unemployed 13 6% Born Overseas 44 23% Not Fluent in English 19 5
% With Broadband
Connectivity59 70
% of Volunteerism 7 16
% Travel by Car 71 61% In Need of Disability
Assistance7 5
Health profile of the project beneficiaries
Health Indicators Sunshine Greater
Melbourne
Victoria
% Physically Inactive 44.2 32.2 32.6
% Male Overweight 32.1 35.7 35.7
% Female Overweight 21.4 22.2 22.6
% Male Obese 16.7 17.0 18.0
% Female Obese 17.8 15.5 16.0
% Type 2 Diabetes 4.0 3.4 3.4
% High Cholesterol 5.7 5.3 5.4
% Fair or Poor Health Status 19.7 13.5 13.5
% Male with Mental problems 10.4 9.5 9.9
% Female with Mental problems 12.3 11.4 11.6
% at Health Risk* 65.4 52.7 53.6
500 m catchment analysis of open spaces
Source: E Daw / Sykes Humphreys Consulting (2008) Brimbank open space and playground policy and plan, p33
500 m catchment analysis of playgrounds
Source: E Daw / Sykes Humphreys Consulting (2008) Brimbank open space and playground policy and plan, p33
Social benefits gained from park visits
Active estimate
Visits by 37% residents more than
once a week
Marginal annual value
$107 k – $432 k
Net present value
$2.2 M – $9.8 M
Conservative estimate
Visits increase by 13%
Marginal annual value
$38 k – $190 k
Net present value
$0.65 M – $4.2 M
• 37.6% of people in the Sunshine area visit a green space weekly or more often compared to
the Victorian average of 50.7% (VicHealth Survey 2011)
• Population above 18 years of age in the study area 2,244 (37% = 830; 50% = 1,122)
• NPV: Social discount rate of 3.5% and project life of 50 years
Avoided health costs of physical inactivity
10% increase in physically active residents
Within 500m = $ 43,711 per year
Within 1km = $75,049 per year
• 65.4% of people in Sunshine suffer from at least one health risk: smoking, alcohol,
physical inactivity, obesity (Social Health Atlas of Australia 2011)
• 44.2% of population in Sunshine physically inactive (Social Health Atlas of Australia
2011)
• Average annual cost per physically inactive person in Australia : $756.66 (Dedman
2011)
Potential increase in property values
Within 500 m radius of project park
• Private benefits $2.3 million to $18.2 million
• Increased council revenue $6,000 to $46,000 per year
(2012–13 rate schedule)
• Federal government may receive capital gains tax of $1
million – $9 million
Other benefits
• Increased thermal comfort for visitors in summer
• Carbon sequestered – 22 tonnes per year
• Biodiversity and habitat benefits
• Flood reduction services
• Potential for linked bike/walking paths, whole-of-
creek water quality strategy
Living Brooklyn assessment of welfare costs of
air pollution
Almost 18,000 people assessed as being effected
Total social cost per annum of air pollution from the precinct is equivalent to:
$40 million ranging from $30 million to $67 million.
While this dwarfs direct health costs and costs of maintenance, suppression and
compliance, removing air pollution as part of an integrated urban water system
strategy would deliver these costs as social benefits to be accrued over the long
term.
Jones and Ooi (2014) Living Brooklyn: Baseline report on the economics of the urban water
cycle in the Brooklyn Industrial Precinct, Victoria University
Attributes of green infrastructure
• Quality – how healthy and (bio)diverse is it?
• Connectivity – how well are different places linked?
• Permeability – how accessible are different parts of the urban form for nutrients, water, plants and animals?
• Structure – how physically diverse is it?
• Longevity – how sustainable is it over time?
Combined, these attributes describe the resilience of green infrastructure
David Flanders, Open Knowledge Foundation Australia
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
14
16
18
20
1943 1953 1963 1973 1983 1993 2003
Da
ys P
er
yea
r a
bo
ve t
hre
sho
d (
>°C
)
Days 35-40 Days >40c
0
5
10
15
20
25
0.0 0.5 1.0 1.5 2.0 2.5 3.0 3.5 4.0 4.5 5.0
Da
ys
pe
r y
ea
r
Warming (°C)
>35°C >40°C >35 97-11 >40 97-11d
Climate is changing now, not some undefined
date in the future
Days of extreme heat in Melbourne’s west are already at the level project for 2030
(Jones et al., 2013)
Health and well-being profiles
• High personal health, community connectivity and diversity
Biking, running, community events, family gatherings
• Increased community contact and mental wellbeing
Low-energy exercise, community contact, contemplation, higher
mental wellbeing
• Lack of community connectedness, reduced welfare, lowered
mental wellbeing
Lack of open space, limited walking and exercise areas, driving
culture
• Disease, higher health costs, stress, loss of personal and
community welfare
Low open spaces, many roads, low connectivity, limited walking
paths
• Economic (productivity) loss, lowered community, welfare
High exposure to heat and cold, poor built infrastructure
Active
participation
Passive
participation
Inactivity
Morbidity
Mortality
Fully connected
Coverage &
diversity
Patchy quality
Poor quality
Weeds in
pavement
Urban green infrastructure profiles
• Cool cities, highly integrated built and green infrastructure, high
biodiversity emerging in urban setting
Mix of amenity, ecology and activity; integrated grey and green
infrastructure
• Open spaces within walking distance, high flora and fauna diversity
in open spaces
High quality ‘people’ and ‘nature’ spaces, strong links between
• Drive-to high quality areas, mixed spaces within walking distance,
degraded ecosystems with good spots
Some high-quality spaces; other areas mixed quality
• Quality open areas are few and drive-to, rest poor quality, weedy
creeks and poor water quality
A few low-quality open areas, lack of facilities, weedscapes
• High heat island effect, no recreational space, few species, concrete
drains
Little open space, hard surfaces, weedy open spaces
Links between urban green infrastructure and
social welfare
Increasing
benefit
Avoided loss
Active
participation
Passive
participation
Inactivity
Morbidity
Mortality
High
quality GI
Low quality
GI
Fully
connected
Coverage &
diversity
Patchy quality
Poor quality
Weeds in
pavement
Measuring social welfare benefits of GI:
policy snakes and ladders
Snakes
• Dollar-equivalent values of social welfare are not seen as important as ‘real’ dollars
• Development of GI is responsibility of many players and benefits are highly diffuse
• People do not understand how funds are allocated to different purposes (GI funding and benefits not transparent)
Ladders
• Communities really do value these assets
• Communities with these assets do not look back with regret but communities who lose them often do
• Benefits accrue over long periods of time therefore can be substantial (and do feed back into the economy)
Conclusions
Two assessments suggest that the site-based benefits
of urban green infrastructure can provide substantial
returns in social welfare
These assessments do not include a wide range of
added benefits from other ecosystem services
A full economic analysis could be used to contrast the
benefits of investing in urban green infrastructure
compared to other forms of infrastructure
Thank [email protected]
Acknowledgements
CSIRO and the Commonwealth Collaborative Research Network for supporting Dr Mekala, Celeste Young, Daniel Ooi, Darren Coughlan, Dr Darla Hatton MacDonald, Greening the West and City West Water, Brimbank City Council (especially Adrian Gray and Tashia Dixon), Office of Living Victoria, National Climate Change Adaptation Research Facility.